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How do you hear God’s voice? And how do you know if your faith is really your own? Many of us were told that following Jesus meant doing the right things: getting baptized, going to church, becoming a member, praying the right prayer. Those things are good, but Paul warns that we can deceive ourselves into thinking we’re something we’re not. At some point, like learning to ride a bike or a young bird leaving the nest, we have to take the leap and make our faith our own. In this episode from the Life in the Spirit series, we look at Galatians 6, Jesus’ picture of the sheep and the goats in Matthew 25, and his promise in John 10 that his sheep know his voice. Why do so many of us struggle to hear God? Part of it is the noise. We live with something in our ears at all times, and we often expect God to speak through something dramatic when what we need is to get quiet and be open. Faithful, mature Christians learn to listen to the voice of Jesus. This message closes with a simple daily practice anyone can start: five minutes with Jesus. Learning to Fly Salem Magley Church Decatur, Indiana

Do I really have to go to church? Plenty of people say you can worship God anywhere, and you can. But something is setting the pace of your life whether you've noticed it or not, and that pace shapes the kind of person you become. In this episode, Pastor Chris starts with John Clem, a 12-year-old drummer boy in the Union Army during the Civil War. Drummer boys set the pace for the whole army. If the soldiers couldn't hear the drum, they couldn't move as one. From there, the sermon argues that community worship sets our pace. It costs us something: we have to show up, give up some control, and learn to put other people first. It tells the story of Jesus year after year, the same story that set two disciples' hearts burning on the road to Emmaus. And the order of a worship service gives us a different drumbeat to live by all week: gathering into God's presence, hearing the word, responding to it, and being sent into the world. If you've drifted away from church, or wondered whether gathering with other believers really matters, this episode is for you.

What if the thing you're most devoted to, without ever calling it worship, actually is? This episode asks a harder question: when does ordinary devotion cross the line into something the Bible would actually call worship? From there the message traces worship back to its roots in Genesis, where God creates humanity for relationship and keeps pursuing people, Adam and Eve, Abraham, Moses, long before any of them are looking for him. It moves through Deuteronomy's command to love God with your whole heart, soul, and strength, not just for an hour on Sunday but in the ordinary rhythm of every day, and closes with Isaiah and Paul's warning that worship which doesn't actually change you isn't worship at all, it's performance. If you've ever wondered whether you might be pouring your devotion into something other than God without realizing it, or whether worship is bigger than what happens on Sunday morning, this episode works through it from Scripture. A Life of Worship Salem Magley Church, Decatur, Indiana

What actually gave him the power to heal, forgive, and cast out demons? Was there some kind of Jesus Juice? In this podcast, Pastor Chris Hirschy walks through the Gospels to find the answer, tracing the Holy Spirit's presence from before Jesus was even born, through his baptism, into the wilderness, and through every miracle credited to something more than willpower. Mary and Joseph learn Mary's pregnancy came from the Spirit. John the Baptist promises the one coming after him will baptize with the Spirit. Jesus stands up in his hometown synagogue and claims that same anointing for himself. Then the episode gets to the part most people don't expect: Jesus never planned to keep that power to himself. He promises it to Nicodemus, then to his own disciples, before he ever leaves them. Unlike Michael Jordan, who couldn't actually hand off his talent, Jesus can, and does.

Most of us secretly believe we get to write our own rules for a good life. Then somewhere along the way, a religious teacher asks Jesus a direct question: out of everything God commanded, which one actually matters most? Jesus's answer cuts through centuries of religious debate and lands on two things: love God with everything you have, and love your neighbor as yourself. In this episode, we dig into what the Bible actually means by good and evil, why the Old Testament commandments were never meant to be a finish line, and why loving God has almost nothing to do with how you feel about him. We also look at Jesus's hardest claim, that the way to actually find your life is to be willing to lose it, and what that costs in practice. This episode kicks off a new series called Life in the Spirit, built around one simple, uncomfortable idea: there's already a way to live that works, and it was never ours to invent.

Why do some people in the church get all the attention, while others feel like their contribution barely counts? In Corinth, people were ranking each other by whose spiritual gift seemed more impressive, and it was tearing the church apart from the inside. Paul's answer wasn't to smooth over the differences or pretend everyone's gift matters the same amount in the same way. His answer was to point back to the one Spirit behind every gift and the one King every believer is united under. In this sermon, Pastor Chris walks through 1 Corinthians 12 to unpack what the Holy Spirit is actually doing among a group of people who don't have much else in common. You'll hear what spiritual gifts really are, why comparing yours to someone else's misses the point entirely, and what it means for a body made of wildly different parts to actually function as one. If you've ever wondered where you fit in the life of a church, or whether the gift you've been given even matters, this one's for you. United Living, Salem Magley Church, Decatur, Indiana.

Is there a standard every Christian is supposed to live up to, or does faith just look different for everyone? This episode works through Galatians 5:13-25, where Paul tells a group of new believers they've been set free, then immediately warns them what that freedom isn't for. Paul draws a hard line between what he calls the works of the flesh and the fruit of the Spirit. The works of the flesh, it turns out, aren't really a list of individual sins so much as one thing wearing a lot of different masks: chaos. The fruit of the Spirit isn't a set of rules either. It's what a transformed heart actually produces, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control, and Paul insists that fruit, not performance, is the real measure of whether someone's actually walking with God. This episode gets into what Christian freedom is actually for, why you can't walk by the Spirit and gratify the flesh at the same time, and why nobody can see your heart, but everyone can see what it grows. Standard Living, Salem Magley Church, Decatur, Indiana.

Everybody's got a Mr. Hyde. The part of yourself you don't want anyone to see, the impulses you know you shouldn't indulge but can't quite shake. Robert Louis Stevenson wrote about it in 1886 and it still lands, because the question underneath it never went away: are we doomed to be ruled by that side of ourselves, or is there a way out? This episode works through Romans 8:1-17, the passage where Paul finally brings his whole argument home. There's no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus, but that freedom isn't the end of the story. It comes with an obligation to actually live differently, to set your mind on the Spirit instead of the flesh. Paul walks through what it means that Jesus became a sin offering, why the law was never going to be enough to save anyone, and how the Spirit doesn't just forgive you, it makes you a child of God and an heir with Christ. If you've ever wondered whether grace means anything goes, or wondered if you're stuck fighting the same sin forever, this one's for you. I Am Free, Salem Magley Church, Decatur, Indiana.

You can't see the turn until you're already in it. That's true in rally car racing, and it's true in life. Sin has a way of showing up before you know it's there, quietly rewriting the road ahead. This episode looks at the Holy Spirit as exactly what a rally car needs, and what we need too: a co-driver who calls out the next move before we can see it coming. Starting in Genesis, where sin first shows up as an animal crouching at the door, we trace how it takes over the human heart completely, and how God commits to humanity anyway. From there we look at how the Holy Spirit convicts, how repentance and baptism work together, and what it actually means to be sealed and adopted as God's own. We close by asking what holiness really is, and it's simpler than most people think: living like Jesus. If you've ever wondered why the same sin keeps tripping you up, what baptism is actually doing, or what it means to live a holy life without turning into a rule keeper, this one's for you.

What does the Holy Spirit actually do, and does God really live inside ordinary people? This episode traces the Holy Spirit through Scripture, from Genesis, where he's hovering over the waters before creation even begins, through the tabernacle and temple, where his presence fills the room. He rests on a craftsman, a handful of leaders, and a couple of unlikely bystanders, and the prophets promise something even bigger is coming. That promise breaks open at Pentecost, landing on Jews, Samaritans, a man actively working to destroy the church, and people with no prior claim on the story at all. By the end, Paul makes a claim that's easy to skip past: believers themselves, not a building, are where God now lives. This episode walks through that whole arc and what it actually means for how you live.

Where is Jesus right now, and has he forgotten about the mess the world is still in? Two thousand years after his resurrection, evil hasn't been erased, suffering hasn't stopped, and Jesus still hasn't come back. So what happened to him? This episode traces what the New Testament actually says about Jesus after his ascension, that he returned to his Father's right hand as the reigning King, that he serves as our human advocate who understands exactly what it's like to be tired, hurting, and tempted, and that he promised he would come back. Pastor Chris Hirschy walks through Acts, Ephesians, Hebrews, and Matthew to show why Jesus' story feels paused rather than finished, and why that pause is actually good news. Along the way, this conversation gets honest about the tension of living between Jesus' departure and his return: how to hold onto hope when judgment still feels far off, why no one can know the day or the hour, and what it looks like to keep working, make disciples, and live the way of Jesus while we wait. If you've ever wondered whether Jesus abandoned us, or what he's actually doing right now, this episode is for you.

Why did Jesus have to die? It's a question that sits at the center of the Christian faith, and it's one this episode doesn't rush past. Starting all the way back in Genesis 3, where God first promises a coming "snake crusher" who will defeat the serpent even as he's struck down, this episode traces the long arc of Scripture that leads to the cross and the empty tomb. Along the way, we look at why sin is a bigger problem than we tend to admit, why ancient Israel's sacrifices had to be repeated year after year, and how Jesus becomes both the final atonement sacrifice and the new Passover lamb. Then we turn to the resurrection and ask what it actually accomplished: not just forgiveness, but a real defeat of sin, Satan, and death itself. If you've ever wondered why Christians put so much weight on the cross and resurrection, or wondered how Passover, sacrifice, and Jesus all connect, this episode walks through those questions with the Scripture texts front and center. It's honest about what's resolved and what still feels unresolved, and it ends with a question we'll pick back up next week. The Son: the Savior, Salem Magley Church, Decatur, Indiana.

Why did Jesus come? Most Christians have a quick answer. But when you actually sit down with Mark's gospel and watch Jesus work, casting out demons, healing the sick, going toe-to-toe with the Pharisees, redefining what family means, you start to see that his mission was bigger and more specific than a one-line answer can hold. Jesus came to establish the kingdom of God. That's what Mark wants you to see from the very first verse. And everything Jesus does in those early chapters--the exorcisms, the Sabbath confrontations, the parables about seeds and lamps, is him pushing that kingdom into the world and making space for it to take root. In this episode, we walk through Mark's gospel to trace that mission and message, and then we ask the question that Jesus himself keeps asking: will you follow me? The Mission and Message of the Son Salem Magley Church, Decatur, Indiana.

Who was Jesus of Nazareth — really? Not the version filtered through centuries of tradition, but the one you find when you actually read what he said about himself and what the people closest to him said about him. Jesus's favorite title for himself was "Son of Man" — a phrase most people have never thought twice about, and one that points to something far bigger than most expect. His followers called him the Word of God, the Messiah, God incarnate. The stories surrounding his life keep pointing in the same direction. This sermon works through the evidence — what Jesus claimed, what his closest followers confirmed, and how three ancient figures from Israel's scriptures converge in one person. By the end, John 3:16 means something it probably never meant before. Jesus, the Son of God. Salem Magley Church. Decatur, Indiana.

The world is broken. You don't need to be convinced of that. What you might need is an answer to the question that follows: if God is good, why did he let it get this way? It's one of the oldest objections to faith, and it deserves more than a bumper sticker response. In this episode, Pastor Chris works through the biblical answer — not a philosophical workaround, but the actual story Scripture tells about what went wrong and what God has been doing about it since day one. Starting in Genesis 3, we see how human rebellion didn't just break a rule — it broke the world. But the story doesn't end there. It never does. From Noah to Abraham to David to Isaiah to Daniel, there's a thread running through all of it. A plan taking shape. A king being promised. A servant being prepared. And a son of man who will one day ride the clouds and take his seat next to the Father. God the Father is not indifferent to the mess. He's been working to fix it from the beginning. This episode traces that thread and makes the case that the problem of evil has an answer — and the answer has a name. Why Does God Allow Evil? A Biblical Answer — Salem Magley Church, Decatur, Indiana